War Committee Asks Army and Navy to Correlate Lumber Purchasing Activities

In a letter to General E. B. Gregory, Quartermaster General, Dr. Wilson Compton, Executive Offrcer, Lumber & Timber Products War Committee, made a complete review of the current situation of the industry, and called on the Army to correlate the competition between the services for deliveries of the same lumber products, and co-ordinate its specifications with its purchasing efforts. A similar communication was sent to the Navy.

June 22, 1942.

Dear General Gregory: f have been looking at some of the estimated future requirements of the Quartermaster General for lumber and timber products. You have ahead of you more trucks, beds, bunks, boxes, containers, bo'ats, poles, tanks, stretchers, shelving, furniture. These mean more lumber, more lumber and different lumber than is being produced. Also, the Navy requires a great deal of the kind of lumber the Army wants.

For some time we have been urging a further coordination of Army lumber specifications, a further unification of Army lumber buying and at least a better correlation of the competition between the Army and the Navy for the same products of the same mills for deliveries at the same time. Your office for some time has had in contemplation certain steps in these directions. But, except in a few cases of urgent procurement, there has been no action, at least no visible action.

' I know nothing about the Army's needs for lumber except what the Army says. But I do know the lumber industry, what it is doing and what it can do. Can you not assign someone to explore the facts and suggestions in the enclosure for their bearing on all prospective Quartermaster's requirements of lumber and timber products, and not piece-meal as at present. If this is a "battle of smokestacks" we urge you to act now so that these industries which operate the smokestacks in the lumber industry may act now too.

Yours sincerely, WILSON COMPTON, Executive Officer, Lumber and Timber Products 'War Committee.

POLICY ON LUMBER AND TIMBER PRODUCTS Basic Factors

1. War Production Board Estimate of 1942lumber requirements for war, defense and what they classify as "essential civilian" purposesc is 38.7 billion feet. National consumption in 1941 was about 34 billion feet; production about 33 billion.

2. National lumber production in 1942 so far is 3/o less than 1941. Currently it is running about 4/o over 1941; lumber stocks arc l8/o less than a year ago and. l4/o less than the first of this year. Lumber consumption in 1941 was 9/o greater than 194O. In 1942 shipments have been 6/o greater and new business lo/o greater than in 1941.

3. Log production on the West Coast during the early part of. 1942 is reported "off" about 10/o because of labor diversion. Important western pine planing mills are reported closing for lack of skilled labor. 'Southern pine logging, dependent over 80/o on rubber tires, is beginning to lose log hauling contractors. Many southern operations are already partially closed because of inadequate labor.

4. Loss of labor through "pirating," especially in the South Atlantic and Pacific Coast regions, by continuing diversion to other war industries in which draft deferment is indicated; also, of course, by draft.

5. Many individual mills with cooperation of employees are now increasing production by overtime work. This partially compensates the enforced reduction in production elsewhere.

6. All principal species of lumber are now covered by price ceiling schedules; all others are covered by general Price Regulation Order No. 1.

7. In the South in 1940, the latest year for which comparable information is available, nearly 3A/o of. the lumber was produced by mills cutting less than 10,000 feet a day and more than @7o was produced by mills cutting not ovet n,W feet a day. In the West the same year 9/o was pro' duced by mills cutting less than 20,000 feet daily. General Effects of W.P.B. Limitation Order L-121

1. About 15,000 sawmills apparently are operating.

2. With almost no exception the larger mills have continued production; many have increased production under freezing order. Apparently also hundreds of smaller mills which have no Army or Navy orders, are customarily financed by wholesalers and distribute their products through wholesalers, have shut down.

3. "Freezing" present stocks and future production of small mills, which have no Army or Navy orders and no practical means of securing them, apparently encourag'es shut-downs. The resulting reduction of national production of course adds to the aggregate difficulties in the long run if not in the short run.

Army and Navy Lumber Needs

1. Apparently Army and Navy need some grades of some species of both softwoods and hardwoods, but not all grades of any species and not any grade of some species.

2. Apparently Army for administrative reasons can buy lumber only from larger mills and from concentration yards which have the facilities for participating in auctions and in negotiated contracts. Apparently for practical administrative reasons the Army cannot deal with thousands of small sawmills.

3. Meantime hundreds of mills daily are sawing logs into sizes and items which are not much needed by the war agencies. With few exceptions the length, width and thickness of lumber which, after seasoning, will be available for use, are determined when the log goes through the sawmill. The most needed sizes should be known at that time. Otherwise most mills will continue to cut the standard commercial assortments which are known to be ordinarilv salable.

4. Ratio of lumber stocks to consumption is the lowest in over fifteen years of record, Softwood stocks today are less than 4 billion feet, less than half the stocks of fourteen years ago, the most recent period of comparable national lumber consumption. Hardwood stocks by the same measure, are only 4O/o.

5. War procurement of lumber must be based primarily on the future production, not on existing stocks. To maximum extent possible logs should be sawn into thicknesses, lengths and widths of lumber most needed for war purposes.

6. The only practical way to do this is to enable all the sawmills to know in advance what sizes are most urgently required; and in the case especially of the smaller mills to contract in advance for the output of the desired items, sizes and gtades and species.

Specifications

1. Many present and prospective Army requirements of timber products were originally planned in steel or plastics or other materials. Hence the wood specifications sometimes are hasty, often not well polished and not well correlated with other specifications.

2. Army specifications writers under time pressures tend to concentrate on the preferred grades of preferred species to the exclusion in part or whole of other usable grades and species in more readily available supply.

3. These preferred specifications were readily supplied by the lumber industry when the total required volume was comparatively small in relation to the national stocks and national production. Temporarily and for the present they cannot be supplied under the present conditions wherein war, defense and essential civilian requirements substantially exceed production.

4. The immediate acute pressure of war demands against available lumber supply is due fundamentally and almost entirely to war construction. That is expected to taper off during the last thftd of. 1942. Thereafter the lumber industry should gradually be enabled to provide the war agencies with their "preferred" sizes and grades.

5. For the present all agencies will have to use "available" rather than "preferred" species, sizes and grades. Army and Navy Should Consider:

1. More adequate current study of information of available stocks and production of "usable" grades,.species and sizes for their bearing on specifications.

2. Regularly and more adequately furnishing to the industry, preferably through thb Lumber and Lumber Products Branch of the W.P.B., information of anticipated requirements of lumber and timber products, including grades items and species and to the extent practicable on special cuttings thicknesses, widths and lengths also.

3. Coordination of specifications and purchasing, including timing of purchasing between agencies of the Army (especially between Engineers, Quartermaster and Ordnance) and between Army and Navy; and utilization so far as practicable of the same facilities within each D'epartment for making the required purchases.

4. Contracting in advance for the entire output of mills which are favorably situated with respect to timber, labor (Continued on Page 28)